Thorn Jack (19 page)

Caught between terror, disbelief, and awe, she rubbed at the photographs, tried to detect fakes, but the tinting and the quality were too authentic. Her stomach churning, she whispered, “So your family likes to play dress-up, Jack?”

“
Finn,
” Christie whispered, and the panic in his voice made her head snap up.

Christie stood near the window, his face white, the beam of his flashlight aimed at whatever stood behind her, smelling of evergreens, smoke, and wild roses. She pushed back her hair, studying the photos of Jack in his different incarnations, and said, “Jack. Do you still play the violin?”

His voice, hoarse, sounded as if it had been torn from him, “You should not have come here.”

Christie kept his flashlight beam on Jack as Finn rose quickly, lost her balance, and fell against the very thing she'd been trying to avoid.

Jack caught her. Her hand struck his chest and remained there, over his heart. Even through his thin shirt, she didn't feel a heartbeat. Her eyes widened. Her breath hitched. She pressed harder, using both hands
.
“
Jack . . .
your
heart . . .”

Christie's light shook as Jack whispered, “I don't have one at the moment.”

She didn't move away, breathing in his scent of wild roses and fire. She desperately twined her fingers around his wrist and gripped hard, her thumb pushing against the tendons, searching for a pulse. His skin was so
cold.
“What has
happened
to you?”

Jack's voice was almost gentle. “It happened a long time ago.”

She stepped away, her shaking hands leaving him. He was white, bloodless but for the blood-red tips of his hair. His resemblance to the coachman in the photograph was even more apparent because of the black-and-white look of him now.

“No heart,” she murmured as ice moved through her veins. “No pulse.
What are you?
”

His eyes silvered like a dead thing, and what little warmth remained in the room was vanquished by cold. “She keeps
her
heart in a box.”

She stared at the young man who had betrayed her, unknown and alien.

Christie grabbed her hand, dragged her back. They whirled, scrambled out the window, and clambered down the fire escape. As a cold wind swept through the tattered weeds, they ran.

When they finally halted at Christie's Mustang and slumped against it, Finn was shaking so badly she thought she'd have seizures. Christie clutched at her hand. “
What happened back there?
First Tirnagoth, now this?”

She couldn't tell him because the words
He's dead
wouldn't form in her mouth.

SHE HAD THOUGHT SHE WOULD
cry when she got home. But she was numb. A thousand different explanations ran through her head as to why Jack didn't have a heartbeat or a pulse, medical miracles included.

Then she decided, firmly and simply, that she had been mistaken. Just because the woods seemed to be haunted by ghost girls and the Tirnagoth Hotel was a paranormal society's wet dream (Christie's words), it didn't mean Jack Fata and his kind were dead things that had learned to pretend to be people.

But a sick terror crawled through her when she remembered the hollow in Jack's chest, the photographs of him from different eras. As she sat on her bed and waited for the poisonous sleepiness to return—it didn't—she went over every encounter she'd had with Jack Fata and slowly realized her safe, dull reality had been shattered.

JACK USED HIS BODY AS
a weapon against the air, moving across the rooftops of the warehouse district until he saw the woods and the silhouette of Tirnagoth. He descended and strode among the trees, bashing branches out of his way while briars scraped at his hands. This time, he didn't bleed.

Had he lost her?

He pushed through Tirnagoth's gates, then wove through the bonfires and dancing bodies. The music tonight was a heathen mess of drums and flutes and whining violins. Fortunately, their only close neighbors were the dead. He could smell candle smoke and blackberry wine. Harp music tinkled from a room above. Someone began to whisper a chant as he pushed through the heavy doors into the lobby. The hotel, once a resort to the rich and famous, was derelict now. Broken glass glittered instead of diamonds. The Gothic gate of the courtyard was knotted with briars instead of tiny lights, and statues were wreathed with dead vines and graffitied with obscure quotes. The rooms were lush with artifacts, tapestries, candles—all stolen from tombs or shipwrecks.

Jack ascended the stairs to the conservatory, where exotic flowers sucked at moonlight. Like these plants, he had been nurtured in an environment of spells and night.

A pale-haired young man holding a staff topped with the bleached, ribboned skull of a stag moved down the aisle of black trees. He wore white jeans and a kimono of ivory silk. His eyes were blue.

“Lazuli.” Jack halted.

“Why aren't you in the black parlor, Jack?”

Ignoring that question, Jack asked his own. “Why would a book levitate in a mortal girl's house?”

Lazuli Gilfaethwy caressed a crocus and it seemed to swoon beneath his touch. Jack set one hand on the stag skull. “Answer me.”

“What kind of book?”

“It looked like a journal. A girl's—” Jack was suddenly blindsided by a vision of a ballerina in black tulle, red tears streaking her face. He heard an echo of violins and a wolf howling.

“Jack, what did you see just now?”

Jack smiled, hard and bright. “Nothing.”

Lazuli lowered his eyelashes and caressed the stag skull as if seeking divine protection. He avoided touching Jack's jeweled hand. “The answer to your question is a geist.”

“A poltergeist?”

“A geist is a remnant of someone once loved. You had a vision just now. You recently had a heart and blood, Jack.” Lazuli hesitated, then whispered, “You are becoming something unknown to us.”

Jack gazed at him darkly. “You won't tell them, will you.”

“No, Jack.” Lazuli leaned against a tree, his head down. “I won't. Does she know? Your mortal girl? What you are?”

“She's not my girl. She doesn't belong to anyone.” He turned and walked away, back into the shadows where he belonged.

Out of Lazuli's sight, his swagger vanished. He halted, stumbled. Something dark and glittering swirled through him. The unholy strength was returning.

He would use it against them.

 

C
HAPTER
T
EN

When the soul has left the body, it is drawn away, sometimes by the fairies. If a soul eludes the fairies, it may be snapped up by the evil spirits.

—
I
RISH
F
AIRY AND
F
OLKTALES,
W
. 
B
.
Y
EATS

J
ack has no heart
. As this thought spiraled in her head, Finn moved in a daze through her classes, bumping into things and flinching at every unexpected sound. In history, Professor Avaline fixed her with a clear, grave look before beginning a lecture on the War of the Roses, but all Finn could hear was the word
heart
.

Then Mr. Wyatt, whose dreadlocks and muscled body made him look like a pro athlete, not a metalworking instructor, summoned Finn to him in the hall outside Studio Photography.

“Miss Sullivan.” His deep voice was gentle. “You know Nathan Clare.”

“Sort of.”

“And you have the enmity of Reiko Fata?”

Finn had never heard anyone use the word
enmity
in conversation before. “I barely know her.”
What is
Reiko, she thought,
if
Jack
isn't right?

“Leave the Fatas be, Miss Sullivan. And that includes Nathan Clare.” He smiled as if he'd merely said
Have a nice day,
and he walked on.

“Mr. Wyatt,” she called in the nearly empty corridor, “who
are
they?”

He halted and didn't turn. “You mean,
what
are they, Miss Sullivan. It's best for you if you don't find out.”

As he strode away, Finn bemusedly wandered in the other direction and avoided speaking with anyone else. As she crossed the campus to Laurel Hall, she wondered about the connection between Wyatt and the Fatas. She didn't know what to tell Christie and Sylvie, who were the only ones who would believe her; she felt a terrifying isolation. The Fatas were uncanny and she'd been warned away from Nathan Clare a second time. And
Wyatt
knew about them.

She nearly ran into Angyll Weaver on the stair. They stopped, gazing warily at each other.

Angyll Weaver had had her own unpleasant encounter with a Fata, one that had put her in the hospital. When she stomped past Finn, Finn followed her down the corridor and called her name. Angyll twisted around. She was alone, perfectly put together in a little pink dress and heels. Her eyes were wide.

Finn approached carefully, said in a low voice, “What did Caliban do to you?”

The mask slid back into place and Angyll smiled brightly, but the stitches in her brow were still there, and one eye was shadowed with a bruise despite the concealer. “Who?”

Finn grimly forged onward. “The Fatas, Angyll. They're not like us, and I think you found that out in the cemetery.”

“You're craz—”

“Don't say I'm crazy.”

“You are.” Angyll leaned forward, eyes narrowed. “Because you think Jack Fata is
different
from the rest of them.”

Finn wanted to say,
Jack Fata doesn't have a pulse.
“Caliban Fata hurt you, didn't he?”

Angyll drew back and looked around, clutching her books as if they were a shield. When she returned her gaze to Finn, she whispered, “Annie knew. She tried to warn me.
He . . . turned . . . into . . .”

Her pupils had dilated with terror. Finn stepped forward. “Angyll, it's all ri—”

“No, it's not.” Her whisper was shrill. “Because I know now they're going to
kill me
.”

Finn heard Christie's voice behind her. “Can't you leave Finn alone? She doesn't need a queen bitch yapping—”

“Christie!” Finn whirled, shook her head in warning. Christie looked confused. She turned back. “Angyll—”

But Angyll Weaver had once again sheathed herself in ice and spite. She smiled. “They've noticed
you
. Don't think I'm the only one who needs to watch her back.”

As she stalked away, Finn narrowed her eyes at Christie, who was gazing after Angyll, frowning. He said, “What was she saying to you?”

“She's scared. And I was going to find out if Caliban was in that cemetery with her, when you came along and sent her back into bitch mode.”

“Ah. Really?” He slouched against a locker. “Maybe we could go to the Weavers' shop and apologize after work.”

“She thinks the Fatas want to kill her.”

“She's always been a little paranoid—”

“But she's not.” Finn glanced up as the doors to the lecture hall across from them opened and students came pouring out. “We
will
go to the Weavers' tonight. I need to ask her about Caliban, Christie. Maybe you can use your charm.”

He straightened. “Are you pimping me out?”

“Yes I am. I'm late for algebra.” She gave him a quick wave good-bye. As she wove distractedly through the other students, he called after her, “Maybe you can borrow one of Jack's fur coats—you know, to complete your pimp image!”

“Later, Christie.” And she tried not to think of all the stories she'd been raised with, about creatures who mimicked human beings and preyed upon the vulnerable.

LATER, BENEATH THEIR APPLE TREE,
Christie presented Finn with a small box. “I made it . . . what's inside, not the box.”

She opened the box and found a chunky bracelet of dark metal awkwardly formed into what seemed to be leaves. For the first time that day, she smiled.

“Wyatt had us working with iron today. I also made what appears to be a ring for Sylvie. I decided I'm not going to be an artist who works with fine metals, and engineering is out of the question.”

She slid the bracelet onto her wrist, and the metal warmed to her skin. “I like it. So . . . you might want to know that Wyatt warned me about the Fatas. I find that to be extremely suspicious behavior on his part.”

“Aren't they all suspicious, Finn? Miss Emory talks to her plants. Hobson is always reading books about alchemy—”

Sylvie dropped down beside them. “And Professor Fairchild writes poetry about beautiful young things.”

“Wyatt works as a club bouncer at night. And Avaline and Perangelo are always trading recipes on bits of parchment.
Parchment.
Not paper. I think they're all aliases and part of some splinter pagan cult.”

Sylvie pointed at the box in Christie's hand. “Is that for me?”

As Sylvie admired the clunky ring he'd made, Christie said to Finn, “Now tell Sylvie what you found when we investigated the dark heart of Jack Fata's den.”

Heart.
Finn's hands went numb. Then she told them, her voice steady, about Jack.

“No
heartbeat
?” Christie looked as if he wasn't sure he'd heard correctly.

“None. And I mean that in the anatomical sense. No heart. No pulse.” Just talking about it made her feel less crazy.

As Sylvie rocked back on her heels and Christie rubbed his hands over his face, Finn knotted her fingers together so they wouldn't tremble. “I couldn't believe it either. I pretended it was a mistake . . . it wasn't. I had my hand on his chest for
two
minutes, at least. And he had no pulse.”

“I can't believe it.” Sylvie looked at Finn. “I can't believe you broke into his apartment without me.”

“Sorry. Did you not hear the part where I said Jack had no heartbeat?”

“Maybe it's a trick. Like when those Indian fakirs stop their own hearts—want me to try and find Reiko's heartbeat? I will if you ask.” Christie ducked from the withered apple Finn flung at him. It was actually comforting to her that they weren't taking this seriously. Maybe she
had
been mistaken.

She opened the binder where she'd placed the printouts of Jack's and Reiko's ancestral look-alikes. “Want to see something?”

“So I'm not crazy.” Sylvie pulled the Kali lunchbox from her backpack and pushed up the lid to reveal a collection of old-fashioned photographs. “I get them from garage sales, friends . . . look at these.”

She set aside three tattered photographs. First was a shot of a Victorian pub crowd gazing toward the camera; in the forefront was a girl in an elegant gown and hat, smiling—she had Phouka Fata's face. The second picture was of a group of young men in 1940s fedoras and suits, leaning against a roadster. One of them looked exactly like Caliban Fata. The last photograph was of a croquet party in the '30s, young men and women in sleek clothes holding mallets or lounging in wicker chairs. Sprawled in one chair, his head bowed, his face in profile, was Jack Fata.

Sylvie looked up, eyes wide. “I thought they were just, you know, strong resemblances . . .”

Finn touched the photograph with Jack in it. It hurt her, seeing him so far away, untouchable.

Sylvie lifted a sepia-tinted picture of three children in white clothing. The older boy had dark hair, and the other boy was blond. The girl's hair was black and blond. “These are Malcolm Tirnagoth's children, the ones who died from influenza. The Tirnagoths were one of Fair Hollow's first families. Their ancestors came from Ireland in the late 1700s.”

“Are the Fatas one of those families?”

Sylvie shook her head. She flipped through the photos, pointed to family tintypes with script written beneath them. “Tudor. Kierney. Drake. Valentine. Luneht. Tredescant. Hester Kierney, Claudette Tredescant, and Ijio Valentine hang out with the Fatas. So do Nick and Victoria Tudor and Aubrey Drake. The Lunehts left Fair Hollow years ago, after their son killed himself. What I'm saying, Finn, is that the Fatas have always been here. And I don't have any photographs of
their
ancestors . . . so, maybe, in the pictures you have,
those
are their ancestors.”

“Or maybe”—Christie's voice spiked—“maybe they don't have ancestors because they goddamn freakishly never age.”

They were all quiet, gazing down at the photographs. Then Christie said, “Nah.”

CHRISTIE CAME TO PICK UP
Finn at the bookstore that night.

“I'm ready to charm Angyll Weaver.” He took off his woolen hat and shook out his hair. He solemnly met her gaze. “How do I look?”

She studied him. “Could you at least take off the Parrot Games T-shirt?”

“I spilled coffee on the shirt underneath.”

She sighed. “Let's go.”

“So.” As they walked from the bookstore, Christie shoved his hands in his pockets. “You think Angyll will clarify our impossible and insane theory? Or confound it?”

“You're talking like
them
.” She had tried not to think about Jack all day, but he haunted her now. “I want to know what they are.”

“I'm not sure I want to find out. Unless it was black mold hallucinations, we saw ghouls in the Tirnagoth, which the Fatas own—maybe they're witches?”

“No,” Finn said, her voice low, “they're something
else.
They're a secret.”

As they passed the Marlowe Theater, she saw the flicker of a scarlet gown in the matinee crowd, and a memory surfaced like a drowned thing, taking the form of the red carp in the pond near which Lily had used to meet the wolf-eyed man whose kiss had left a scar on her skin . . .

Finn had been fifteen and Lily Rose sixteen when their da had taken them to a performance of the San Francisco Ballet's
The Little Mermaid
at the War Memorial Opera House. It had been Lily Rose's birthday. Finn had glimpsed in the crowd a tall girl in a red gown, her black hair beaded with garnets. The beautiful girl had met Finn's gaze before turning away.

. . . another memory followed of San Francisco, and a banner that read “Scarborough Fair” fluttering between two striped poles. She'd been eating a caramel apple as Lily, in a dress of gauzy red cotton, moved toward a young man with wolf eyes and a scar across one cheekbone. She thought about the reel of film from Lily's boyfriend, Leander, and the shadowy man in the background. She stopped walking.

“Finn.” Christie's nervous voice drew her gaze up. Only a few feet away, Reiko Fata was entering the theater on the arm of an elegantly dressed man whose face was shadowed.

Finn wondered if she'd really seen Reiko Fata in San Francisco when she'd been little. If she had, it meant Reiko had been there for a reason, to meet with the nameless, wolf-eyed man from Lily's journal and Finn's memories. Her stomach twisted as she began to suspect a very real and extremely horrifying connection.

“Finn, are you listening?” Christie was pointing at the poster of a male dancer dressed like a crimson Hamlet. “That poster's from the twenties. And that's the boy I saw in the bathtub at the Tirnagoth.”

Since any clue to the Fatas was now crucial, Finn dragged Christie into the theater lobby, where they found the brochures with historical information.

They continued down the street as Finn scanned the pictures in the brochure, portraits of famous dancers who'd performed at the Marlowe. She found the Hamlet as Christie read from his brochure, “Devon Valentine. Tragic suicide in 1926. Well, what a surprise.”

They walked to Hecate's Attic, which had a Closed sign on the door, but the lights were on and Anna Weaver was dusting the shelves. When she saw them, she walked to the door, unlocked it, and beckoned them in. As faux Native American music fluted from the sound system, a woman peered from the stockroom and smiled at Christie. “Angyll's not here, Christopher.”

Christie said, “ 'S'allright, Mrs. Weaver. I'm just here to talk to Anna. This is Finn.”

“Hello, Finn. Anna, I'll be upstairs.” Mrs. Weaver moved away, her heels clicking. She obviously didn't know Finn was the one who'd punched her eldest daughter.